The best-stocked German beer hall in Hampton Roads plans a new location in Virginia Beach next year.

The Bier Garden is a 21-year institution in Olde Towne Portsmouth, started by two generations of the Osfolk family.

Over time, the beer bar and schnitzel house has expanded piecemeal into a multi-room space, with a covered patio and a 400-beer import selection that sometimes includes Belgian greats like Cantillon, and an annual keg-tapping of 14-percent ABV Samichlaus beer that might drain in less than an hour.

For two decades, the bar sold more Aventinus doppelbock than any other bar in the world, including the brewhouse in Munich.

And if Bier Garden's owners secure approval from Virginia Beach, there will soon be another just like it.

By early next year, says co-owner Stefanie Osfolk Brown, the Bier Garden plans to open a new Festhaus at 2272 W. Great Neck Road. It's at the corner of Shore Drive, in the space most recently home to Tubby's Corner Market.

"It's gonna be very similar to the original Bier Garden," Osfolk Brown said. "But this one we'll be able to open it all in one go. With Portsmouth we did it a little at a time."

As in the original location, the planned 5,000-square-foot Bier Garden Festhaus will have room to seat about a hundred. But the space will be more open and airy than the cozy, partitioned space in Portsmouth.

Themed as a festival hall, like the many long-tabled beer halls of Southern Germany, the Festhaus in Virginia Beach will sport tarps and a large draped blue-and-white checkerboard flag. Osfolk Brown described it as having a bit of a "cathedral feeling."

The building is under construction, and will be receiving a new roof and a new coat of paint.

In addition to a voluminous selection of bottled import beers, the Festhaus will host 22 beer taps and a food menu similar to the one in Portsmouth, which includes Bavarian pork rinds and vast selection of sausages, schnitzels and sammies.

But while the first Bier Garden was a multi-generational affair – Kevin and Stefanie founded the original with their German-born parents, Anton and Hannalore Osfolk, when Stefanie was just 20 years old — the new spot will belong only to the younger generation.

Osfolk Brown says she and her brother plan to preserve what the family began two decades ago.

"The food is the same. The beer's the same. But the feeling is a little different, it'll feel more like a Festhaus. But we're trying to keep it as similar as possible. We don't want to change too much."